Drilling holes in my Skoda Kushaq's tail light to drain water

As I was washing the car, I was shocked to notice that the water had filled up to the halfway mark of the reverse light and the brake light assembly.

BHPian rohan_2911 recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

I own a Skoda Kushaq, purchased in June 2022, which has done about 17,000 kilometers.

Within a month of purchasing the car, I had an incident where I hit a tree branch while reversing. Fortunately, the damage wasn't significant and only caused a few cracks on the rear right brake light assembly.

The damage to the rear brake light assembly

I generally keep the assembly covered with transparent sellotape to prevent water seepage. However, during the monsoon season, some water would seep in and drain out when the boot door was opened and kept in the topmost position. The rear brake light assembly in the Kushaq is split into two parts: one part is mounted on the boot door, while the other part is mounted on the body. The damage and cracks were mostly on the part of the light mounted on the boot door.

This rainy season (2024), I started getting a ‘Check Rear Brake Light’ warning indication on my MID. Initially, I thought the cello tape had worn out, allowing more water to seep inside during heavy rain. A few weeks ago, I reapplied fresh tape after removing the old one, and the warning went away for some time.

However, a few weeks ago, the warning reappeared and persisted. I assumed the brake lights were no longer functioning properly and needed to be replaced. But as I was washing the car a few days ago, I was shocked to notice that water had filled up to the halfway mark of the reversing light assembly and the brake light assembly. This part of the assembly was mounted on the body, which I hadn't been paying attention to earlier. I suspect that the water was shorting out some contacts and drawing a higher current, triggering the warning indication.

A few inches of water filled all the way upto yellow dotted line!

Warning on the MID

Initially, I thought I had no option but to replace the entire rear right brake assembly. However, upon closer inspection, it looked like I could drain the water by drilling a few small holes in the light assembly, which I did the next day.

Dismantling the rear brake light assembly - quite easy to do, all you need to do is unscrew 2 screws

Tilting the Brake light assembly to get most of the water out

All the water did not drain out

Getting the drill ready

Water draining off the small hole I created on the section that houses the reversing light

Water draining off the small hole I created on the section that houses the brake light

Using a tissue paper to wick off all the remaining water with capillary action

Created a small hole in the Brake light assembly that was attached to the boot door as well

Taping up the holes - I want to see how much time it takes for water to fill up! So that I know how chronic the problem is.

Started the car - and Voila the warning symbol was gone!

All in all a day well spent - and a lesson learnt, will keep a close eye on this sort of stuff and will check all the peripherals and accessories at least once a few months.

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